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House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., today sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder regarding oversight of the Department of Justice's litigation policy with respect to large financial institutions accused but not convicted or adjudicated of illegal conduct in conjunction with the financial crisis. "On...

Student loan debt has become the scapegoat for nearly all that ails the U.S. economy, from depressed home ownership , to lower rates of entrepreneurship , and even the sluggish recovery from the great recession.&nbsp; The problem with all of this blame is that the accusations are difficult to substantiate.&nbsp; Much of the discussion about the effects of student loan debt focuses on comparing outcomes faced by individuals with student loan debt to those of individuals without student loan debt.&nbsp; The differences in observed outcomes are cited as evidence of an impact of student loan debt.&nbsp; But, there are two reasons why this approach doesn&rsquo;t tell us what we need to know about the effects of education debt.&nbsp; First, the population of individuals who take on debt to pay for college is different from the population of individuals who take on little or no education debt.&nbsp; These differences are sometimes observable and sometimes not.&nbsp; This means that outcomes faced by borrowers and non-borrowers are likely to differ for reasons that are unrelated to the debt itself.&nbsp; In order to effectively measure the effect of debt, we would need to be able to control for all of these differences.&nbsp; This presents a methodological challenge because not all of the differences are observable.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Second, the population of borrowers (and non-borrowers) has been changing over time.&nbsp; This means that longitudinal studies comparing borrowers and non-borrowers are difficult to interpret.&nbsp; The changes in behavior, such as home ownership, that occur over time may be due to trends in borrowing, but could also be due to the changing characteristics of the borrowing population.&nbsp; Due to these challenges, we&rsquo;ve yet to pin down the answers to our questions regarding these relationships.&nbsp; Understanding the relationship between student loan...

Source: RealtyTrac &#160; Each quarter, RealtyTrac releases its "Home Equity and Underwater Report." According to RealtyTrac&#8217;s data, "9.1 million U.S. residential properties were seriously underwater.&#8221; Mortgages that are &#8220;seriously underwater&#8221; exceed a property&#8217;s value by at least 25 percent. They also account for 17.2 percent of all properties with a mortgage. That number decreased slightly... Read More

CFPB announced on Thursday a proposal to revise the tests that determine which financial institutions are covered under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act - establishing a uniform loan-volume threshold of 25 loans per year.

Zillow Inc. (Z:US) is seeking to acquire rival Trulia Inc. (TRLA:US), people with knowledge of the matter said, in a move to combine the two most-visited U.S. real estate websites. Zillow could value Trulia at as much as $2 billion in a purchase, and an agreement may be announced as soon as next week, said one of the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. Talks between the companies are ongoing and may not lead to a deal.

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan has always been a student of the economy. Since the financial crisis, he's become a student of human nature. Sitting in his office with a view of the Washington Monument in the distance, Greenspan is eager to share the insight distilled in his recent book, "The Map and the Territory," due out in paperback this fall.

If you're looking to buy a home, finding a newly built one may be tough. The share of new homes being sold is unusually low, in part because fewer of them are being constructed. It is not likely to get better anytime soon. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that new home sales fell 8.1 percent in June from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted rate of 406,000. That's down 11.5 percent from a year earlier. Read full article &#62;&#62;

Blackstone Said to Prepare $700 Million Sale of Home Debt Bloomberg Blackstone Group LP, the largest U.S. landlord of single-family homes, is working with Deutsche Bank AG to sell about $700 million of securities tied to mortgages on rental properties, its third such deal, according to a person with knowledge of the plans.

by Patrick Reed, National Housing Conference In a push for crowd-sourced innovation and better transparency, federal agencies are opening up their data vaults to the public, substantially increasing the accessibility of this information. State agencies and local governments are increasingly following suit. In general, most would agree that improved data accessibility is a good thing; however, increased availability is not without its challenges, particularly for low-income households and their advocates. Consider the propositions of the following paradox: A. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Open access to data improves opportunity for low-income households. · &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Example: Using publically available data, PHAs can create opportunity maps to locate census tracts with strong social capital and strong transit access. Housing Choice Voucher counselors can use these maps to help inform their clients' decisions. B. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Open access to data harms opportunity for low-income households. · &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Example: Using an online tool, a high-income family realizes that a home they are interested in purchasing falls within the boundaries of a census tract with a large number of foreclosures and vacancies. They decide not to pursue the property any further. Current residents in the neighborhood miss out on the addition of a stable family that could have potentially drawn in more resources and higher-income neighbors. If we're thinking in terms of net gains and losses, we can't say that both of these propositions are simultaneously true. Lisa Prevost's article in last Friday's New York Times does an excellent job of contextualizing the data access problem. Third-party companies help people access detailed information about neighborhood demographics, income levels...

&#160; &#160; As part of their $25 billion settlement in 2012 of lending abuse claims, five of the nation's largest banks agreed to modify mortgages for borrowers struggling to make their original monthly payments. To the consternation of many investors, the settling banks were given credit not only for modifying loans that they held in [...]

JPMorgan Seen Facing Bigger Fight With Mortgage Investors Bloomberg JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co. (JPM) may need to pay more than the $4.5 billion it offered to settle investor claims over faulty mortgages packaged into securities before the U.S. housing crash, a report prepared for bond trustees shows. Trustees should reject the&nbsp;...

The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged three Morgan Stanley entities with misleading investors in a pair of residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) securitizations that the firms underwrote, sponsored, and issued. Morgan Stanley agreed to settle the charges by paying $275 million to be returned to harmed investors. In an asset-backed securities offering, federal regulations under the securities laws require the disclosure of delinquency information for the mortgage loans serving as collateral. &nbsp;An SEC investigation found that Morgan Stanley misrepresented the current or historical delinquency status of mortgage loans underlying two subprime RMBS securitizations that came against a backdrop of rising borrower delinquencies and unprecedented distress in the subprime market. &ldquo;The delinquency status of mortgage loans in an RMBS securitization is vital information to investors because those loans are the primary source of funds by which they potentially can recover and profit from their investments,&rdquo; said Michael Osnato, chief of the SEC Enforcement Division&rsquo;s Complex Financial Instruments Unit.&nbsp; &ldquo;Morgan Stanley understated the number of delinquent loans behind these securitizations during a critical juncture of the financial crisis and denied investors the full extent of the facts necessary to make informed investment decisions.&rdquo; According to the SEC&rsquo;s order instituting a settled administrative proceeding against Morgan Stanley &amp; Co. LLC, Morgan Stanley ABS Capital I Inc., and Morgan Stanley Mortgage Capital Holdings LLC, these securitizations were collateralized by mortgage loans with an aggregate principal value balance of more than $2.5 billion.&nbsp; They were the last subprime RMBS that Morgan Stanley sponsored, issued, and underwrote.&nbsp; The offerings themselves were called Morgan Stanley ABS Capital I Inc. Trust 2007-NC4 and Morgan Capital I Inc. Trust...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell to the lowest level in nearly 8-1/2 years last week, suggesting the labor market recovery was gaining traction.

D.R. Horton Earnings Fall as Company Incurs Impairment Charges Bloomberg D.R. Horton Inc. (DHI), the largest U.S. homebuilder by revenue, said fiscal third-quarter earnings declined as the company&#39;s sales margin shrank and it incurred $54.7 million in pretax charges. Net income was $113.1 million, or 32 cents a share, for the three&nbsp;... and more&nbsp;&raquo;

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